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Frank Deford

 

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Frank Deford



 
 
Benjamin Franklin Deford, III (born December 16, 1938, in Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore, Maryland

Baltimore is an independent city and the largest city in the U.S. state of Maryland in the United States. Baltimore is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay....
) is a senior contributing writer for Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated

Sports Illustrated is an United States sports magazine owned by Mass media conglomerate Time Warner. It has over 3 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men, 19% of the adult males in the United States....
, author
Author

An author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created....
, and commentator.

rd has been writing for Sports Illustrated since the early 1960s. In addition to his Sports Illustrated duties, he is also a correspondent for HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel
Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel

Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel is a monthly sports newsmagazine on HBO that debuted on April 2, 1995 in television. The show was "spawned by the fact that sports have changed dramatically, that it's no longer just fun and games, and that what happens off the field, beyond the scores, is worthy of some serious reporting," according to...
 and a regular, Wednesday commentator for National Public Radio
National Public Radio

National Public Radio is a privately and publicly funded non-profit membership media organization that serves as a national Radio syndication to 797 public radio List of NPR stations in the United States....
's Morning Edition
Morning Edition

Morning Edition is an American radio news program produced and distributed by National Public Radio . It airs weekday mornings and runs for two hours, and many stations repeat one or both hours....
.

His 1981 novel, "Everybody's All-American
Everybody's All-American

Everybody's All-American is a novel by longtime Sports Illustrated contributor Frank Deford and later made into a Everybody's All-American motion picture directed by Taylor Hackford....
," was named one of Sports Illustrated's Top 25 Sports Books of All Time and was later made into a movie directed by Taylor Hackford and starring Dennis Quaid.

In the early 1990s Deford took a brief break from NPR and other professional activities to serve as editor-in-chief of The National
The National (newspaper)

The National Sports Daily, or The National, was a short-lived sports newspaper in the United States which debuted January 31, 1990 and folded after 18 months....
, a short-lived daily U.S.






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Benjamin Franklin Deford, III (born December 16, 1938, in Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore, Maryland

Baltimore is an independent city and the largest city in the U.S. state of Maryland in the United States. Baltimore is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay....
) is a senior contributing writer for Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated

Sports Illustrated is an United States sports magazine owned by Mass media conglomerate Time Warner. It has over 3 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men, 19% of the adult males in the United States....
, author
Author

An author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created....
, and commentator.

Background

DeFord has been writing for Sports Illustrated since the early 1960s. In addition to his Sports Illustrated duties, he is also a correspondent for HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel
Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel

Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel is a monthly sports newsmagazine on HBO that debuted on April 2, 1995 in television. The show was "spawned by the fact that sports have changed dramatically, that it's no longer just fun and games, and that what happens off the field, beyond the scores, is worthy of some serious reporting," according to...
 and a regular, Wednesday commentator for National Public Radio
National Public Radio

National Public Radio is a privately and publicly funded non-profit membership media organization that serves as a national Radio syndication to 797 public radio List of NPR stations in the United States....
's Morning Edition
Morning Edition

Morning Edition is an American radio news program produced and distributed by National Public Radio . It airs weekday mornings and runs for two hours, and many stations repeat one or both hours....
.

His 1981 novel, "Everybody's All-American
Everybody's All-American

Everybody's All-American is a novel by longtime Sports Illustrated contributor Frank Deford and later made into a Everybody's All-American motion picture directed by Taylor Hackford....
," was named one of Sports Illustrated's Top 25 Sports Books of All Time and was later made into a movie directed by Taylor Hackford and starring Dennis Quaid.

In the early 1990s Deford took a brief break from NPR and other professional activities to serve as editor-in-chief of The National
The National (newspaper)

The National Sports Daily, or The National, was a short-lived sports newspaper in the United States which debuted January 31, 1990 and folded after 18 months....
, a short-lived daily U.S. sports newspaper. It debuted January 31, 1990 and folded after eighteen months. The newspaper was published Sundays through Fridays and had a tabloid format.

Deford is also the chairman emeritus of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation
Cystic Fibrosis Foundation

The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation is a non-profit organization in the United States established to provide the means to cure and control cystic fibrosis ....
. He became involved in cystic fibrosis education and advocacy after his daughter, Alexandra ("Alex") was diagnosed with the illness in the early 1970s. After Alex died on January 19, 1980, at the age of eight, Deford chronicled her life in the memoir Alex: The Life of a Child. The book was made into a movie starring Craig T. Nelson
Craig T. Nelson

Craig Theodore Nelson is an United States actor.Nelson was born in Spokane, Washington to a drummer father. Because another Craig Richard Nelson was registered with the Screen Actors Guild, he registered as Craig Theodore Nelson....
 and Bonnie Bedelia
Bonnie Bedelia

Bonnie Bedelia is an United States actress....
 in 1986. In 1997, it was reissued in an expanded edition, with updated information on the Defords and Alex's friends.

Deford grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, and attended the prestigious Gilman School
Gilman School

Gilman School is an independent all-boys school located in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. Founded in 1897 as the Country School for Boys, it was the first country day school in the United States....
 in Baltimore. He is a graduate of Princeton University
Princeton University

Princeton University is a private university university located in Princeton, New Jersey, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League and has the largest per-student Financial endowment in the world....
 and now resides in Westport, Connecticut
Westport, Connecticut

Westport is a coastal New England town located on Long Island Sound in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Connecticut, 47 miles north of New York City in the United States....
, with his wife, Carol. They have two surviving children: Christian (b. 1969) and Scarlet (b. 1980). Their youngest daughter Scarlet was adopted a few months after the loss of Alex.

Awards and accomplishments

  • Member of the National Association of Sportscasters and Sportswriters
  • Six-time U.S. Sportswriter of the Year winner
  • Twice voted Magazine Writer of the Year by the Washington Journalism Review
  • National Magazine Award
    National Magazine Award

    The National Magazine Awards are a prestigious series of American awards that honor excellence in the magazine industry. They are administered by the American Society of Magazine Editors and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York City....
     recipient
  • Christopher Award
    Christopher Award

    The Christopher Award are presented to the producers, directors, and writers of books, motion pictures and television specials which affirm the highest values of the human spirit....
     winner
  • Winner of a 1988 Emmy Award
    Emmy Award

    The Emmy Award, also known as the 'Emmy', is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards....
     for his work during the Seoul Olympics
  • Winner of a CableACE in 1994 for writing the HBO Sports documentary Arthur Ashe: Citizen of the World
  • Dick Schaap Award for Outstanding Journalism
    Dick Schaap Award for Outstanding Journalism

    The Dick Schaap Award for Outstanding Journalism was established in 2002 to honor the memory of one of Americas pre-eminent sports writers, Dick Schaap....
     recipient in 2003


Published works

  • Five Strides on the Banked Track: The Life and Times of the Roller Derby, Publisher: Little Brown & Company (June 1971), ISBN-13: 978-0316179201
  • There She Is: The Life and Times of Miss America (1971) ISBN 0-670-69858-X
  • Everybody's All-American
    Everybody's All-American

    Everybody's All-American is a novel by longtime Sports Illustrated contributor Frank Deford and later made into a Everybody's All-American motion picture directed by Taylor Hackford....
     (1981)
  • Alex: The Life of a Child (1983) ISBN 0-670-11195-3
  • Spy in the Deuce Court (1986) ISBN 0-399-13134-5
  • The World's Tallest Midget: The Best of Frank Deford (1987) ISBN 0-316-17946-9
  • The Best Of Frank Deford (2000) ISBN 1-57243-360-4
  • The Other Adonis: A Novel (2001) Sourcebooks Landmark, ISBN 1-4022-0011-0
  • An American Summer: A Novel (2002) Sourcebooks Landmark, ISBN 1-4022-0059-5
  • The Old Ball Game (2005) ISBN 0-87113-885-9
  • True Blue
  • The Entitled (2007) ISBN 1-4022-0896-0


See also

  • WSHU
    WSHU (AM)

    WSHU , is a National Public Radio-affiliated radio station operated by Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut. It primarily features News radio, talk radio and informational programming....


External links

  • at SI
  • also at SI
  • at Yahoo!
  • on Philosophy Talk